Josei

To gain the protection of a powerful family, I tried every trick I knew on a distant cousin whose connection to me was tenuous at best.

My impeccably aloof cousin merely said, “Have some self-respect.”

Later, when I decided to set my sights elsewhere, he regretted it.

Cui Zheyu pinned me against a wall and kissed me, his dark eyes unreadable.

“You think you can stir up my feelings and then run?

Too late.”

After seven years together and more than seven hundred breakups, my ex wanted us to drink a potion that would make us forget each other.

Worried it might taste bitter, he took the first sip.

Then he looked at me as though we had never met—and decided he wanted me all over again.

When he poured away my glass, he had no idea what I had put in it.

Or so I thought.

After I was brought back to the household as its true-born daughter, my parents were full of guilt, and my brother doted on me.

Even the girl who had taken my place was truly kind and virtuous.

Tears on her lovely face, she knelt and bowed her head to me.

“I took your place and left you to suffer all those years.”

I smiled and said it was all right.

Then, before long, I ended up in the pond with her impeccably virtuous fiancé.

I was a midwife.

Up in the hills, I found a pregnant woman.

She claimed to be the wife of the Marquis of Yongning.

She begged me to save her, promising to repay me a hundredfold.

I said nothing and quietly took her home.

To everyone else, she was my cousin, a rich merchant’s concubine who had come to me for shelter.

Because I had just returned from the Yongning estate.

Where I had delivered the marchioness’s baby.

The Noble Consort told me she had traveled here from another world, and that we were all characters in a novel.

She was the heroine, I was the wicked second female lead, and the emperor was the hero.

She was determined to win him over.

Sure enough, she took his undivided favor, then my authority over the palace women.

She even wanted my throne as empress.

“What do you have to rely on but a man’s affection?”

I had finally had enough.

This woman from another world had no power whatsoever.

How dared she reach for my position?

“A sparrow is still a sparrow.

Even if I gave up this phoenix’s nest, could you hold it?”

My ancestors had helped found the dynasty.

My great-grandfather had saved an emperor’s life and received the extraordinary honor of burial in the imperial mausoleum.

My father had inherited the title of duke, and my elder brother was now a chancellor of the first rank.

“You call this ‘palace intrigue,’ do you?

Then let us see what you have to pit against me.”

I was reborn on the very night Liang Zhiyan and Zhao Lingyi had arranged to elope.

As his fiancée, I gave him money for the journey.

Grateful to me, he slipped out of the city with her under cover of darkness.

What awaited them was a life of sleeping rough and grinding poverty.

He would never again have the chance to wield the power he had held in my previous life.

After marrying a blind CEO, I took full advantage of the fact that he couldn’t see me and kissed him again and again.

Blushing, he kept saying, “Miss Lin, please don’t.”

Later, he backed me into a corner, his gaze dark and intent.

“Come here, sweetheart.

I need a cuddle.”

Times were hard.

I was sold to a wealthy household to be a playmate for its young master, who had a lame leg.

He had a delicate, handsome face, but his health was very poor.

His right leg was disabled, he was always coughing, and sometimes he was too weak even to sit up.

Everyone in the household said he would not live long.

Afraid I would be sent away, I slipped into his room and leaned over the edge of his bed.

“Could you please not die?

If you die, I won’t have a home again.”

He paused, then smiled gently and stroked my head.

“All right.

I’ll see if I can stay alive.”

In the third year of keeping Yu Jingchen mine by force, I went bankrupt.

“Keeping a pet canary and feeding it chicken feed.

Impressive.”

As he sneered at me, a system suddenly appeared in my head.

[That walking jinx of a male lead has some nerve complaining.

He’s the reason your company went under.]

I froze.

The system launched into an angry tirade.

[Haven’t you noticed?

Apart from the hate sex every night, all he makes you feel is miserable.]

[The only good thing about this man is his dick.

Set him loose, and I’ll get you a male lead who actually brings you good fortune.]

While I was still thinking, Yu Jingchen eyed the food I’d brought home with distaste.

“Stick with you and I’ll starve to death.

A couple of leaves for dinner, and you expect me to work all night.”

After a few seconds of silence, I opened the door.

“You can go.”

Yu Jingchen rolled his eyes.

“This again?

Don’t think I don’t know you’ve hidden a tracker on me.

You’ll wait until I get far enough away, then drag me back…”

I reached out and pulled the stud with its blinking red light from his ear.

His mocking smile froze.

Qi He had spent three years trying to win me over, mistaking me for the heroine.

He sent me money, made transfers, and bought me a home.

I accepted it all without batting an eye.

I could hear his thoughts: Why hasn’t the romance progress gone up at all?

Am I not giving her enough?

I pretended I had no idea.

So he gave me more and more money.

Until one day, he finally realized he’d been pursuing the wrong woman.